This paper analyses the transformation of elites in the Visegrád Four countries (namely the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia). Drawing on a process-tracing analysis, it argues that the emergence of foreign-led economies in the late 1990s was intertwined with political processes in...

The introduction to the Special Issue on economic elites in Central Eastern Europe establishes a common understanding of elite research and the development of capitalism in Central Eastern Europe as developed during the 1990s. Since then, the composition of elites has been lost sight of by...

The paper contributes to the sociological tradition of comparative institutional analysis. It argues that a distinctive form of capitalism is emerging in post 1989 Central and Eastern Europe, politicized managerial capitalism. This is a bifurcated system, one sub-system internationally oriented,...

Large and sudden economic and political changes, even if potentially positive, often entail enormous social and health costs. Such transitory costs are generally underestimated or neglected by incumbent governments. The mortality crisis experienced by the former communist countries of...